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Photons have both inertial and gravitational mass (even though they have zero rest mass) and exhibit all the characteristics of material bodies. Electromagnetism is as material as breath, and an equally incredible candidate for the vital field.

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Jung stated, ‘The idea of transformation and renewal by means of the serpent is a well-substantiated archetype. It is [a] healing [symbol]’ (Jung 7, par. 184)

The Ouroboros, or Snakes as Symbols of Spiritual Growth and Transformation

The ouroboros, the snake forever swallowing its own tail, is a famous alchemical symbol of transformation. Jung saw the ouroboros much like he saw the mandala, as an archetypal template of the psyche symbolizing eternity and the law of endless return. Instead of looking at life as a finite game played between the bookends of birth and death, the ouroboros symbolizes a dynamic state of change and purification.

A literal ouroboros isn’t necessary for a dream to have its symbolic meaning. Since waking life snakes routinely shed their skins, they are ready made symbols for change and transformation. Dreams where snakes shed skin or seeing snake skins in a dream also symbolize change and transformation. Old, outgrown behavioral patterns, relationships, or even careers may be sloughed off in favor of a new skin more appropriate to the dreamer’s growth.

This process of adjustment may not be comfortable. In waking life, snakes get cranky and irritable during the shedding process and the same may be true for the dreamer. All change involves the surrender of the comfortable and even when changes promise progress, trading the known for the unknown involves a disquieting abandonment of the familiar.

Dream Snakes as Fear Symbols

A lack of firsthand experience with snakes makes the serpent a creature representing a fear of the unknown. As such, snake dreams symbolize that unknown fear. The fear can be an intuitive warning or an unfounded anxiety about some undefinable, hidden something awaiting the dreamer in waking life.

Honest analysis of the waking life provides the key to deciphering snake dreams. Pursuing a life dream, especially an untried one, involves fear. It is tantamount that the dreamer considers whether that fear is founded, or if irrational anxiety is threatening the realization of a waking life dream.

As a USC student, I was able to make my way through the crowd and attain a prime patch of grass for viewing the rock concert–I mean, president’s speech. I voted for Obama, and I still support Obama today; however, I was extremely disappointed to see the attention of so many people be squandered with bread and circus entertainment before Obama spoke, and the further squandered of any opportunity to educate the voters with non-partisan information to prepare us to vote is a just system.

Perplexed by “Nonplussed” and “Bemused”

Yesterday, our “Editorial Emergency” duo of Simon Glickman and Julia Rubiner launched a salvo against a common usage of the word nonplussed, a word they “wager more people get wrong than right.” That opens an interesting can of worms: if a word or phrase used to have Meaning A, but more people now use it with Meaning B, is it time for the Meaning A folks to stand aside?

In the case of nonplussed, the old meaning is “bewildered,” while the new meaning is “unfazed.” Simon and Julia aren’t the only ones bewildered by the change of meaning. Meghan Daum, writing in the Los Angeles Times, was similarly disappointed by Barack Obama’s use of the “unfazed” sense of the word when he said of his daughters’ response to media scrutiny, “I’ve been really happy by how nonplussed they’ve been by the whole thing.” Daum despairs, “Et tu, Obama? It seems so.”

For her L.A. Times piece, Daum consulted with University Pennsylvania linguist Mark Liberman, who ended up posting his response (as well as a follow-up) on the group blog Language Log (where I also contribute). Liberman covers the historical developments well, but commenters on his post, much like those on Simon and Julia’s article, were sharply divided about whether we should simply accept the new meaning of nonplussed as part of our ever-changing language.

A similar case was discussed on Sunday by Jan Freeman in her Boston Globelanguage column, again involving a term related to Obama. Freeman observes that “a lot of writers have thought bemused was just the right word for Barack Obama’s benign, unruffled presence, especially in the debates with John McCain.” As the Visual Thesaurus wordmap for bemused indicates, the two primary meanings of bemused are “deeply absorbed in thought” or “perplexed by many conflicting situations or statements.” The way that political reporters have used it about Obama, however, is “above it all, with a trace of amusement,” in the words of New York Times deputy news editorPhilip B. Corbett. Corbett adds, “but that’s not what bemused means.” Well, it’s not what the word has historicallymeant, but the newer sense, influenced by amused, has become mainstream enough to enter some dictionaries, including Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate.

So here we have two words that have traditionally meant something like “bewildered” or “perplexed,” but they’ve each veered off in different semantic directions — one towards resolute calmness (nonplussed) and the other towards mild amusement (bemused). How common do these new meanings need to become before they can be accepted as standard and conventional, appropriate for good writing and speaking? In the eyes of the Merriam-Webster lexicographers, the new sense of bemused has already reached that point, but the new sense of nonplussedis not quite there.

Even if these newer senses become enshrined in the major dictionaries, that won’t be much solace to those with a more traditionalist take on language, who would see the semantic drift as mere error. We’re left with words that are difficult to use in either the old or the new way: if you use the traditional meaning, you might confuse those who are unfamiliar with with it, and if you use the newer meaning, you might annoy those who feel that the meaning is wrong. Bryan Garner, in his book Garner’s Modern American Usage, refers to such words as “skunked terms”:

When a word undergoes a marked change from one use to another — a phase that might take ten years or a hundred — it’s likely to be the subject of dispute. Some people (Group 1) insist on the traditional use; others (Group 2) embrace the new use. … A word is most hotly disputed in the middle part of this process: any use of it is likely to distract some readers. The new use seems illiterate to Group 1; the old use seems odd to Group 2. The word has become “skunked.”

“Skunked terms” on Garner’s list include data, decimate, effete, enormity, fulsome, and that old usage bugaboo,hopefully. Each of these items has undergone a transformation similar to nonplussed and bemused. Garner’s advice for dealing with skunked terms is one of avoidance: “To the writer or speaker for whom credibility is important, it’s a good idea to avoid distracting any readers or listeners — whether they’re in Group 1 or Group 2.”

What do Group 1-ers and Group 2-ers think? Are these troublesome words best left unused until their meanings become more settled? Should we preserve the old, embrace the new, or attempt to do both?

Sense the Invisible

// Well, Do You?

The process of analyzing the results and considering the application of four psychometric tests I took in a life planning course this summer has taken me back to my roots as a young and eager undergraduate psychology major. The video below is a staple in intro to psychology courses, I am sure, but it’s still fun none the less. Watch and see for yourself:

Interested? You are in luck: click on the picture below to visit the home page for this research, book and corresponding videos described in the book. Enjoy 🙂

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The following excerpt from Alan Schneider’s book Doors in Disguise builds on his discussion of the Creation Diagram. This diagram, shown on the left of the page, includes the seven major chakras and the triad, diad, and monad. In this excerpt, he relates this diagram with conscious existence.

Balance

Alan Schneider

One of the interesting characteristics which can be noted about the symbols on the Creation Diagram is the fact that they all display what the biological sciences refer to as radial symmetry, that is, they all are uniformly constructed around a central point. And the symbols of the Diagram can be said to be harmonically balanced around a common axis. In theory, a radially symmetrical element can be rotated around the central symmetrical axis up to the rate at which the material of which it is composed can no longer remain intact against the resultant centrifugal forces as these increase with that rate. At this point of transition, the element fragments, usually by exploding apart.

The symbols of the Creation Diagram are ideal forms and therefore are not subject to physical destruction. Their “rate of rotation” is shown as “zero” in order to clearly reveal their esoteric form to the Seeker. But in the manifest condition of dense form in the physical plane of expression, all of the symbols are always acting in rotation. This movement is the vibration of consciousness which we experience as the world. Consciousness can be characterized as an interactive vibration of complex physical, spiritual, and mental forms. This is directly related to the combined rates and direction of rotation of the Creation Symbols. When we observe any phenomenon, whether simple or complex, we are always “registering” a global recognition of that phenomenon’s composite vibration, which is composed of the interaction of all the rates and directions of rotation of all of the Creation Symbols which are active in the phenomenon’s consciousness expression. We may or may not be aware of this perception, but it is nonetheless occurring, and the Seeker can make great progress by focusing on the world of events in this way. Additionally, I feel constrained to mention here again that everything is a form of consciousness originating in the Tetragrammaton, even a common pebble, a speck of dust, or an atom.

“We are all free to live in illusion, and we are all free to Seek the Truth.”

Thank you to any and all of those of you out there who have supported the energy I put into design -be they visual or ideological. BeMused was recently featured on Adobe’s design website as a Featured Blog. Check it out!

In the rare books room at Powell’s Books, I stumbled upon The Red Book on display, pages free for the flipping. The images Jung used to express the active imagination told the story when the dutch failed to translate (for me).

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Free will: intention, intensity and purpose from within accelerates mass into energy that propels gears; in essence, we put ourselves in motion, intentionally.

Predetermination: We are moving from forces within and beyond ourselves, accelerated or weighed down by gravity of emotions or environmental circumstance from electromagnetic jolts or pulls. In this way, we move in the rhythm of a schema and script unconsciously. Our bodies are battery like packets of energy, positive and negative and perhaps love guides us to find the opposite charged half that balances the capsule we were born into.

Einstein’s work and theories used the scientific method in geometry and argument. Einstein’s genius rests on building a paradoxical pedestal, using the scientific method to pivot and push back into science its opposite force. Through blocking or unifying Space-Time from the scientific dissection of Space and Time, and blocking Time and its tenses into one elastic and relative perception and perspective, Einstein rightfully earns his place as a man who punctuates the making of History.

In short, science is the drawing of lines, and Einstein bent the lines to form one unified circle, one packet of energy, one universal flowering, one motion moving and accelerating towards the speed of light…

I have Einstein on my mind, and am gulping Einstein’s legacy as quickly as my understanding allows through podcasts, NOVA videos and articles. The link above is one article I found particularly helpful in the alchemy of my understanding of [The Special] Theory of Relativity.